@ethanpil "Next, since Cordova is basically an industry standard, I can do the final Cordova compile myself with the free tools on my system." exactly.. make it part of the publishing pipeline.. but in a way that is easy / well thought out for C3 users to not get caught up with the many options and various outcomes..

Cordova is a standard, we're not asking Ashley to make something new.. we're just saying consider if it would be possible to export directly to Cordova. Rather than having us have to get into command line prompts and managing plugin stuff.. if C3 is smart enough to know what Cordova plugins are installed and developers are given standards to adhere too.. this would allow everyone to focus their energy on one agreed method.. I'm not saying cut off all the others. Guys like you who want options will still have them.. but for most of us we just want the core / well excepted services modern mobile games have to be supported by C3 itself. We shouldn't have to rely on 3rd party plugins to make money off our games. Currently we do and it's ok, but a lot of people are having trouble with it. It's not fun. It makes C2 itself feel less satisfying to invest a bunch of energy into making a game only to have those dreams dashed because something isn't working.

It sounds like you've had no problems with publishing to iOS/Android using many different 3rd party services and that's great, but from the people who have spoken up you are in the minority. ArcadeEd has shared somr really great insight and has had some good results but he's also a javascript developer and has had the means to work through the bugs he has had to work through to get there, which shouldn't be expected of C3 developers.

The reason we're using C3 and why we're spending money on this engine is to 1. make games without code and 2. publish those games to (safe to say most cases) make money from our games. When we are required to rely on 3rd party services for these revenue generating options (even IAP?!) this can be problematic.

Also while I'm glad you like having 5 different options to publish too.. this is not good for most because basically it creates a wild west of hits and misses from everyone.. XDK has been the best overall experience for me, but it's not always.. and I've heard complaints about all the other options too so I don't think any one solution has proven to be the best route. This only hurts C3.. "good luck out there kid.." is basically what it ends up being.. and people who want to use C3 for professional goals should know that C3 IS the solution for publishing their games.

Maybe I'm wrong. If @ethanpil's story is like many other's I'd love to hear all these people who are having smooth sailing creating mobile games that use services like

I know one developer Volkan who I have had a bunch of conversations about this and he's managed (after a lot of hard work and frustration) to get it working but this may not be the case next time he goes to do an update because of so much change.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1hVW6KouHI he's done an amazing job of getting pretty much everything working.. and then you have say me for example trying to do the same thing and getting radically different bugs.. so is it possible? basically if you're lucky.. even for him he's spent way more time just getting the services to work than should be needed.. and that was just android.. then iOS becomes a whole other uncertainty..

it's just mess that could use a better solution than "look at all these possibilities.."

glerikud wrote:If you are referring to Ashley, as far as I know he only works on C3 at the moment. Scirra hired a new member to do the updates for C2.

It's actually the other way round: Diego is working on C3 with me, but I still do maintenance on C2 so it's not left behind.

@ethanpil - several of the features you highlight have existing web standards, e.g. for camera and geolocation. We want to use the web standards wherever possible. Cordova APIs should only be necessary for non-standard stuff like IAP and ads, and maybe push notifications, but web standards are in progress even for that. Even then, for something like ads, there are hundreds of services out there and it's an impossible task to support them all, so in that case it's intended that third party plugins can cover the services we don't cover officially.

@ashley the problem is that many of the web "standards" don't work the same way in a webview app. For whatever reason these APIs are restricted to native and that's one reason that the Cordova solution exists. So are you saying this type of integration will never happen?

@part12studios I think its unreasonable to ask Scirra to create and maintain build platforms. These are complex toolchains that would be time and cost prohibitive.

@Ashley maybe you could help me know if C3 is going to have plugins be something that can be bought in the app in a way similar to the C2 store? I remember reading some of he initial goals of C3 and that one isn't one I recall in the list. Something like the unity asset store. I'm thinking this is a must have thing and this too could help everyone be synced up to the latest plugins.. offer more visibility and competition for services. It also would allow developers to be able to better support and identify community needs and with the folks with the right skill sets.

@ethanpil I guess this is true though I was hoping it wouldn't be. Other services like GameSalad did it through a web interface. ArcadeEd made it sound like it might not be that bad (though devs would be required to download some stuff, but that should be reasonable) however that might have been oversimplifying things. This thread was mainly focused on the suggestion if it were reasonable to do. I understand it's not. My only follow up to that would be to at least have perhaps an order of platforms to try.. point everyone to start somewhere.. for example.. maybe all devs should start with XDK.. I need to do a Poll at some point and ask people what they are using to publish to mobile.

The store used to have plugins for sale in it, but it promptly filled up with plugins costing £40 or more IIRC. I was very worried this would create the perception with new users that they would have to end up paying double or even triple the price of a personal license to get the features they wanted. We thought about having a price cap, but then that undervalues ambitious plugins like Q3D. So it got put on the backburner, and like many things on the backburner, quickly got replaced by more urgent matters. We could consider it again, but then if it's full of expensive plugins which the developers are claiming are must-have essentials in their sales pitch, I don't think that would come across very positively to new arrivals. As it stands it's up to third-party developers to distribute plugins themselves and charge for them independently, and it's up to them to announce updates, communicate with users, etc.

ah ok i never saw this (or noticed) but yea I can understand the concern about price steepness but let's be honest right. the market can dictate this. if the mobile market told us anything it was a race to the bottom. many of these plugins are not actually that difficult to make really IF you have the knowhow. So if 2-3 people make IAP plugins.. with a user star system and prices / sales I don't think that's a problem

Also you might consider with your fears of price gouging to support officially the most critical things developers need (like IAP). I don't think you need to add many, in fact I'd even say IAP is the only one you should consider making official. I'd love to see more, but I know your time is limited.

I mean look at Q3D.. it's "open market" and it's like $35.. if people don't want to pay, then the devs won't make money.. if someone sees a price that's too high.. and sees the audience looking for a cheaper solution.. they can take it upon themselves to offer a better priced alternative.. and if the alternative is better / or worse.. a star system would allow them to be kept honest and help the community reward the best plugins

i'll tell you right now I'd gladly pay $100 for a professional plugin that works! What sucks is paying $10 for one that sometimes works.. or would work if i knew some little trick.. but because the dev isn't full time on the product doesn't get back to me for a week or two.. not their fault really.. not enough money in it to be that available..

new arrivals should just be concerned about making games.. if they enjoy the game enough and spend months making some marvelous product they should realize that a $100 (or whatever amount) for saving the many hours / skill sets it would take to figure out some free / cheap alternative AND knowing that the dev is there to offer support for their product it's fine.

It would cost me much more to hire a single developer to go make a plugin for me.. say $50 an hour.. 2 hours to make a plugin for construct 2? probably an engine they don't know already.. could cost twice that.. maybe more.. and new developers who see a feature they want.. and really understand the value should be ok paying the price.. I know some new users might be students or kids without a lot of money, but they need to realize this is the real world.. developers need to eat.. Unity has better prices (and sometimes much more) for theirs but they have a user base of millions of devs, but some of those plugin devs make their living on the asset store.. no reason C3 developers couldn't or shouldn't do the same..

Ashley, C2 itself is a super bargain.. like i said.. many GameSalad users pay $300 a year for a pro license.. i had a license for about 2 years I think.. of pro.. $600.. and honestly i didn't mind because i was very productive then.. but i stopped because they are too sandboxish.. they had their own IPA / APK service too mind you.. which was nice.. but yea i'm glad i got away from that.. but it was a good learning experience and taught me things that i could bring to Construct 2.

C3 (as I read it) is basically C2 updated.. it's not some radical departure from how C2 works. We have been told that Capx files will open in C3.. there may be some things that change (consider how webstorage was compared to localstorage plugin, a significant change, but necessary move)

As for plugins yep.. you can't in Unity3D either. If I ask $500 for a plugin.. or $5.. it's up to the C3 user to choose if it's worth it. a star rating system will help. Plugin developers will ask themselves if it's worth their time to make a plugin for $3.. and have to sell 300 to make what I deem worthwhile for me time... because I had to spend a week figuring out all the challenges of a given service / conversion. Are there 300 C2/3 users who will even want my plugin? I don't know.. however, I'd love to make $10000 for my plugin too so i can spend more time answering users with problems (if there are any) knowing good reviews and happy customers will drive more sales..

C2 gives you the ability to make your own plugins.. C3 will likely be no different. It's basically .js files with some editing done to expose certain parameters to the editor to act on the plugin's code. Also earlier I said plugins are easy.. this is a bit oversimplified.. some are very easy.. others can be very involved.

C3 is not going to allow non coders to "make plugins".. that's the whole point of a plugin is to connect C2 (non coding) users to bodies of javascript that call on larger solutions like revenue generation that don't care if you're using C2 or Unity or Unreal.. they are just a service.

you gotta yourself as a game developer.. would you rather pay a little more and know you're giving a developer enough value to care to support you or would you rather pay $3 for a plugin and wait weeks to hear back from them? I'd rather see developers get paid for their time... and be there for me if I need them so I can spend less time pulling my hair out because something is wrong and no one will reply. If someone charges a premium for a plugin then skips town.. nothing can stop that from happening but ratings will suffer and people will warn each other..

However I get the feeling from the interactions I've had with the C2 community that it's a good group of people and I believe that the players we've seen making fine plugins so far are going to be continuing to do their good work. Frosty Elk's Parse plugin was great and I did get email support from them when we had issues with it AND our testing found a bug which helped them improve the plugin for everyone. I paid $9 i think for that and it was a great value, but I feel they could charge more and have the time / incentive to do more with it / help people.

I've never heard any developers say how much they have made off any plugins, but I imagine the money they made was modest. how many people really are using parse with C2? We want too so we bought the plugin. I haven't tried Cranberry Parse yet, but I have it because I paid I think $35 to have full access to all of the plugins which is insane value, however that value becomes less when you realize the developer (understandably) doesn't have time to support every issue because there isn't enough money coming in to justify the time it takes to support every issue that comes along.

"C3 is not going to allow non coders to "make plugins".. that's the whole point of a plugin is to connect C2 (non coding) users to bodies of javascript that call on larger solutions like revenue generation that don't care if you're using C2 or Unity or Unreal.. they are just a service."

There's no reason for them not to make it so the users can create their own plugs using the sdk via eventing, other than the extra work involved.It would be a huge selling point.